Saturday, July 30, 2011

Happy Saturday and more from "A 'Slight' History of Golden Age Comic Book Super Heroes" as I present the last "Red Tornado" story in my library. This one's from "All American Comics #47!

Check out this bit of Sheldon Mayer fun and hang on tight for another treat at the end!

As I've stated before, as a young reader of the early 1970's Ma Hunkel's Red Tornado was only hinted at. A curious counterpart to DC's Earth One Red Tornado who was is an android and much different than Ma Hunkel in every way. There were a few pin-ups of the Justice Society and the always seemed to include Hunkel, but in the great sea of mish-mashed reprints in the backs of the comics available to me, NEVER a Hunkel reprint...including in reprints of stroies of the JSA! Where the heck WAS she???

Well, it turns out she DID make an appearance in the annals of the JSA, in fact in their very first adventure. "All Star Comics" #3 which would be the very first appearance of the very first super hero team ever, even telling the story of their first gathering, featured a cameo by the great Ma Hunkel.

H'yar is that cameo...

So see? If not for a little modesty on the lady's part, Ma Hunkel could very well have been that leader of the Justice Society.

Friday, July 29, 2011

Y'all know I loves me some OTR and in particular Paul Rhymer's classic "Vic & Sade". I dig posting them here, too and hopefully hipping some folks to a show they may have never heard before, and have been doing so almost every Friday for a few months now.

However, there's not much I can add to what's already out there on the web and sometimes I feel I'm just recycling what a lot of hard-working folks haefv already done.

However!

There is a blog of force out there with a blogger with even more passion than I have, doing a better job than I of analyzing these shows and even doing some audio editing to highlight the brilliance of Paul Rhymer's glorious work...one of the funniest shows ever done for any medium.

So I'm bowing out of the regular "Vic & Sade" business and gladly as I redirect you Rhymer fans to "The Crazy World of Vic & Sade", just half way up on the next block. Give it a glance and let ol' Jimbo know what you think. I think it's pretty awesome.

As my bow out I'm givin' you a listen to the last 2 undated shows I have from 1940 and the last of my textual observations of the show. A look at the show from "Comedy" from 1980.

Enjoy!

I hope I grabbed a few new ears for this classic bit of comedy. I'm glad to see all the folks celebrating what worthwhile out there on the innerwebs!

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

I've been trying to get back to my drawing board, but I just can't get up the gumption of late. I don't want that to hold up my "A 'Slight' History of Golden Age Comic Book Super Heroes" attempt here, and what's more...I feel guilty when my blog goes dark for a day.

So forging ahead and trying to get the creative juices flowing, let's continue with the heroes in "All American Comics" and see what sparks in the old man's mind.

I've always had an affinity for the oddball characters. Not the ones blazing across the covers of books, but of the hard working stiffs wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy in the back pages. As a kid in the 1970's reading "The Justice League of America", whenever they would have crossovers with The Justice Society of America here would be references to forgotten heroes that I longed to see in action. Colorfully costumed and colorfully storied in their legends, some were only hinted at in "pinups" or in one panel flashbacks.

One of these was a character who popped up as a side character in a humor strip by Sheldon Mayer called "Scribbly", and with the popularity of super heroes in general, shortly took over the strip himself...er...HERself...

Ma Hunkel..."The Red Tornado"!

With the digital age of information upon us, I finally (after 40-some years) got to read a small batch of this feature.

I was NOT disapointed. I think I'll post them all here over the next few days.

I hope you dig Shelly's work as much as I do.

Talk to you soon...hopefully with my pen in hand, but 'til then these feel pretty good.

Monday, July 25, 2011

1954's Mad THE COMIC BOOK swooped in with a story that almost makes my head explode for all of my favorite things it contains. Wally Wood doing some fine dense comical work parodying one of my all time favorite comic strip, Harold Grey's "Little Orphan Annie"!

And he manages to squeeze one of his comically hot femmes in it by the end...what's NOT to like.